Members of the Asian Students Association at Duke are incensed over a fraternity’s decision to throw a themed party replete with offensive Asian stereotypes, including conical hats and geisha outfits. “Herro Nice Duke Peopre!!” read the opening line in the email inviting Dukies to “the return of Kappa Sigma Asia Prime. … According to The Duke Chronicle, the off-campus party was later renamed “International Relations” after a report was filed with the Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life. But the Asian Students Association says the “racist rager” went on as planned despite the name change, and it has the Facebook photos to prove it.”

Flyers protesting an Asian-themed party hosted by Kappa Sigma fraternity

I went to Duke for business school for my MBA, and we were pretty self-contained in our own building away from main campus. I’d say the only time I interacted with undergrads at Duke was in Cameroon Indoor Stadium to watch the Duke men’s basketball team play (Go Blue Devils!). I can’t say that Duke in general is a racially charged campus. In fact, the Research Triangle Park region (the Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill area) is the most liberal part of North Carolina due in part because there are major universities in the area and North Carolina overall is a battleground “purple” state, going for Obama in 2008 and for Romney in 2012.

Living in the South, I found the people I interacted with to be alarmingly friendly – a little bit too much so from a Northeasterner. Of course, the South has the historical issues around race specific to slavery, but like I said, I certainly didn’t experience anything. Maybe there is something about Duke’s undergraduate campus culture – or maybe specifically fraternity culture – that has lead to a slew of such events. Events like these should not be tolerated and I’m glad to see and read that Asians Americans at Duke speaking out and being vocal and the student population overall is trying to do something about it. Personally, I never saw or felt any discrimination during my time at Duke.

Categories:

NOTE: 8Asians.com is a community, and we thank you for being a part of it. While we welcome and appreciate differences in opinion, if you're rude or you're promoting spam, we have a right to edit or delete your comment. Read our comment policy for more information.

If you see a comment that violates the 8Asians.com comment policy, you may flag the comment by mousing over the comment and clicking "FLAG."

Facebook Comments (Beta)

So because you’ve never “felt racism during your time at Duke” that must mean it doesn’t happen. YAY!

zdrav

Many minorities dislike acknowledging racism because being a victim of racism makes you feel disempowered and weak. However, we POC all need to acknowledge that no matter how “good” we are, none of us can singlehandedly overcome the societal difficulties imposed upon us by a racist culture. Whether we become openly discriminated against or not is NOT a reflection of our own ability to socialize or assimilate.

I think too many people, especially Asians, think that they can overcome racism by being a Good Minority. No, you can’t.

zdrav

I’m glad that the Asian-American student community is showing a lot of backbone here, but let’s be honest: how many Asian guys do you think secretly (or not so secretly) want to join that frat, or how many Asian girls do you think secretly (or not so secretly) want to date the guys in that frat? Probably a lot.

Until the Asian-American community can more openly and decisively show that we’re not just a bunch of White wannabes, we’ll continue to be easy targets.

Bob Stockalockapoulos

Rachel, calm down. Even though he didn’t experience the discrimination during his years at Duke, He clearly suggests that “events like these should not be tolerated” and that he’s “glad to see and read that Asians Americans at Duke speaking out and being vocal and the student population overall is trying to do something about it.”

LTE2

“POC all need to acknowledge that no matter how “good” we are, none of us can singlehandedly overcome the societal difficulties imposed upon us by a racist culture”
.
If Asians beat up Asians, I am not sure why a different standard for others.
.
7,000 years or recorded human history shows people do not always like each other, a lot.

.
The biggest complainers of unfair treatment usually deliver their own variety of unfairness.
.
Expectation of civil behavior is reasonable, genuine liking comes only on a 1 to 1 basis, a time consuming but more organic process.

white guy

stop being so sensitive. i was at the party, and i love asians, especially asian chicks cuz theyre so easy

The reason why many Asians don’t acknowledge racism because to acknowledge that they’re being racially harassed would mean they would have to do something about it. And unfortunately many Asians don’t have the balls, the gonads, to stand up for themselves.

ultimately Asians create the environment they want with their purchasing power.

honky wonky

I’ve heard this excuse many times, and yet no statistic has ever shown that Asian-American on Asian-American violence is extremely higher than white or black on Asian violence.

let’s see the numbers before you go on more reifications

honky wonky

he might be racist, but he tells the truth

LTE2

“let’s see the numbers before you go on more reifications”
.
I said Asians, not Asian-Americans. If a purer racial society like China can not produce a more civil culture, I doubt a mixed culture can do much better.
.
I think your choice of screen proves my point about people:
I will quote myself:
“The biggest complainers of unfair treatment usually deliver their own variety of unfairness.”

jlee

What bizarre paranoia

FabiusMaximus

You are 100% correct Rachel, asians don’t have the balls to stand up for themselves. Until they do, they deserve whatever shallacking they receive. You’re all a bunch of heel shifting, shoe gazing Uncle Chongs anyways, this site and it’s creators included. You want to stop bullying from white people? You laugh at them and call them the pedophile relative rapers that they are.

FabiusMaximus

i doubt you were at that party. i bet you were at a chuck e cheese party trying to pick 4 year olds.

Fighting racism doesn’t have anything to do with testicular measurement. Typifying Asians as lacking “gonads” is, unfortunately, both racist and sexist, as the implication is that one must have male genitalia in order to show bravery, and that Asians (presumably male ones) are lacking.

Recent immigrants naturally tend to be more conservative than established citizens who feel more secure in fighting the status quo, whereas people new to the country lack the kind of security that citizenship affords, and so they tend to keep to themselves. Asian Americans born in the U.S. and who are several generations American are much more likely to speak out against discrimination, because they’re not worried about getting deported just for speaking their mind.

Furthermore, many Asian cultures revolve around the cultural concept of conforming to society, rather than having society conform to the individual. It may seem alien to the American ideal of a fierce individualism, but regardless of the pros and cons of individualism versus conformity, there are societal benefits associated with not rocking the boat and wanting to fit in: political stability, obedience to authority, lower crime rates, etc.

Furthermore, with an emphasis on the importance of the nuclear family and showing deference and respect to one’s elders, particularly one’s own parents, many Asians may be reluctant to participate in political activity, which can not only be dangerous but controversial enough to affect one’s employment opportunities, etc. and thus, causing their parents no end of worry which Asian children prefer to avoid.

Of course, I’m not suggesting all Asians are like this, or that they all have these kinds of cultural backgrounds, but they’re things to take into account about Asian Americans before effectively blaming the victim by passing the burden of fighting racism on to those who are oppressed, rather than placing the onus on those who are responsible for perpetuating racism, and moreover have the privilege to actually do something about it.

And personally, as an Asian Canadian, I’ve been marching in anti-racism, anti-sexism, anti-homophobia, anti-ablism, etc. rallies since I was 16. However, I am a little too prudish to be showing off my bollocks to complete strangers so you’ll have to take my word for it. ;P

Conflating Asians who were born and raised in their own country with Asian immigrants and/or Asian Americans is not useful, as they aren’t the same culturally. Certainly, there’s an influence, but I would argue that living amongst a wide variety of different peoples from different cultures can as likely breed acceptance and open people’s minds, as it can cause ethnic, racial, cultural, etc. conflicts.

Asians who were born and raised in their own country have likely never encountered racism (especially not of the Western/North American variety): they may have experienced discrimination if they are an ethnic minority within their own country (much like the Irish did in the UK). Asian immigrants on the other hand have traditionally faced all manner of discrimination in their adopted land (it is an unfortunate part of the immigrant experience), and so are much more likely to be sensitive to racial discrimination because they have experienced it themselves. Ironically, a common experience with anti-Asian racism may have forced Asian immigrants from many different nations and ethnicities who, back home, might have been busy hating each other, to work together against a greater threat and in so doing, sowed the seeds for the kind of Asian American unity that is seen today.

Because just like English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish (not to mention French, German, Scandinavian, etc.) people are all collectively referred to as ‘white’ or ‘Caucasian’ even if those countries have a historic animosity towards each other, likewise, in North America, all Asians are seen as being, well, ‘Asian’ without really knowing or caring about ethnic, cultural, national, etc. distinctions.

I’ve been called all kinds of racist names for Chinese, even though I am Japanese, but it never failed to make me incensed, because for all that I was not Chinese and they were mistaken, I was not upset because they mistook me for Chinese, I was upset because they thought they could get away with being racist to Chinese people, or Asians in general. It also made me understand some of the many racist incidents that Chinese immigrants and Chinese Canadians/Americans have to put up with every day, which I might not have ever realized if I had not experienced it personally, and it made me feel more protective towards all people of Asian background, because we share this common threat to our survival.

I understand what you’re saying, and to a certain extent, I agree with it: I was quite the assimilationist in my youth, because I had this mistaken notion that simply being “colour-blind” was enough. I’d failed to understand or take into account my own internalized racism which had inculcated me to the systems and societal structures of a racist society, with a mass media brainwashing me to want the same kinds of things that the majority racial demographic wants, and ironically, I think it was largely unintentional on the part of the mass media.

Some would like to put it down to a conscious racism inherent in mass media, popular culture, etc. in (North) America, but I doubt if it was even particularly intentional: if they failed to put enough Asian faces in ads, or as main characters in movies and TV shows, it wasn’t even that they were actively trying to discriminate against Asians so much as it simply didn’t occur to them to do so, or think about the impact that that might have on Asian Americans to feel discluded from mass media and popular culture, except perhaps as stereotypical representations of the nerd scientist, the math geek, the kung fu expert, etc. If they thought about it at all, they probably thought: “Yeah, ‘Kung Fu’ is a great idea for a TV show, but it would sell better if there was a white guy as the main character” and thus effectively subverting any potential roles for Asians and turning them into white roles.

My point being that yes, I too was largely ignorant to these subconscious factors which made me crave the kind of societal acceptance of being “allowed” to become a member of a fraternity, because those images were sold to us by the mass media, by TV and movies, and I would not be surprised if for many of my friends, I was their token Asian minority friend to show people and each other how not-racist they were.

And this was a time when I was perhaps at my most political in terms of anti-racism as well, so just because one is even politically engaged in anti-racist efforts, doesn’t necessitate that one isn’t blind to one’s own internalized racism. Raising awareness and increasing people’s knowledge can hopefully start to change things for the better.

LTE2

“because we share this common threat to our survival.”

.
This is a bit overly dramatic. I grew up in a time where ethnic insults were not that unusual and I was on the receiving end of several.
.
In a country like the United States, mixing a variety of different people will produce a lot of friction, more so in the lower economic orders.

I guess it depends where you live. Certainly there are still pockets of racist violence everywhere in North America, so in that sense it is still a threat in a very visceral sense.

For me the defining moment in terms of being confronted face to face with racist violence was when I was 16 and was trying to buy something in downtown Ottawa (I think it may have been a Housemartins t-shirt) at this head shop, when I was surrounded by 5 neo-Nazi skinheads and threatened with a beating if I didn’t comply with their demands (they ended up telling me to give up one of my anti-racist patches I had on my jacket). I was really lucky to have been able to come out of it unscathed, at least physically, but I suppose emotionally, psychologically I was more than a little traumatized because I could not venture downtown alone for the longest time because of that, I went to school carrying a wooden chair leg hidden in my jacket (my friends questioned its effectiveness as it wasn’t particularly hefty, but it was more of a psychological assurance since I’m not sure what I would actually have done with said leg if I was forced to use it): there was at least one neo-Nazi in my high school who had once shoved me rather violently from behind just as I’d gotten to the top of the stairs, so my fears weren’t entirely unfounded.

Back then (early ’90s), I’d spent a lot of time engaging in political rallies, protests, marches, etc. for anti-racism, anti-sexism, anti-homophobia, protecting abortion clinics, supporting labour groups, gay pride, etc. but it was all pretty academic for me until that day I ran into those neo-Nazis. I guess that was really what spurred me to become increasingly more political, even though it was scary (there were rumours of a neo-Nazi running around Ottawa with a gun, and there were incidents in the news of a local park where neo-Nazis would lay in wait for people they thought were gay and go and bash them; one local resident who worked as a waiter was mistaken for gay and thrown off a bridge and drowned). Those racist tensions culminated in May of 1993 after an anti-racist demonstration at a local Boys & Girls Club that had been rented out to a white supremacist festival of racist bands (http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/adl/skinhead-international/skins-canada.html) turned into betwen neo-Nazi skinheads who’d been bussed in from around the province (and some from the US) for the show, and many anti-racist demonstrators were hurt. The irony was not lost on anyone that there were neo-Nazi skinheads ‘Sieg Heil’-ing on the steps of the Peace Tower on Parliament Hill.

Things have certainly changed for the better in Canada since the ’90s: some of the major white supremacist organizers in Canada have either been deported (Ernst Zundel), killed (Wolfgang Droege) or allegedly left the movement entirely (George Burdi), but there are always new people stepping up to take their place. Fortunately, demographics and politics have changed considerably as well since those days, and the days when racist thugs could patrol the streets of Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, in their jackboots, looking to beat up minorities are largely over. But even then, there are still a lot of racists around, they’re just more underground now. A lot of them have come crawling out of the woodwork due to the nascent Idle No More movement for First Nations rights, and right wing groups like the Sun News Network (fittingly dubbed ‘Fox News North’ by some ;P) have only sought to incite ethnic conflict in Canada all over again.

Fighting against anti-Asian racism is, for me, only a small part of a larger battle against all forms of discrimination, prejudice, bullying and injustice against all marginalized groups in society, because even if we have no other commonality, we share one thing which should inspire solidarity amongst us all, which is that as visible minorities we will always be the first to be targeted in acts of violent tribalism, whether we’re East Asian, South Asian, First Nations, black, female, intersex, LGBTQA, seniors, differently abled, intellectually challenged, suffering from mental illness, etc. And there are many groups in society today who are still being physically and sexually assaulted for no other reason than who they were born as, and in that sense, I do feel it is a fundamental threat to survival for us all.

LTE2

“Certainly there are still pockets of racist violence everywhere in North America, so in that sense it is still a threat in a very visceral sense.”
.
You make good points and I am not saying there aren’t societal outliers who have never developed the ability to ignore those they do not like. In the United States one problem we have is liberal elites that love to create varying behavior standards for different groups (to show how nuanced they are).
.
These varying social standards are bound to create new frictions and new hates. The immigration debate is a prime example where American citizens are expected to observe law while people who ignored immigration law are to be given a pass.
.
Many illegals are Hispanic or Asian and you would expect resentment from the “White” population as well as established minorities and those who immigrated legally.
.
The above is one example of many I have seen over the years. It becomes harder to reduce racism when you have situations that breed resentment.

Thank you so much for this entry. I had no idea that this happened at Duke. Even though I grew up in the Northeast I also faced a lot of racism. What really encourages me about this incident is that people did not turn a blind eye and actually did something about it. I just blogged about recently regarding the Dove Sketches campaign.

iko: STFU mikey STORMloq, the same garbage that is found in STOMRfront. Aren't you yourself doing the same "...making subjective statements about your own ethnicity, just... – What Do White Supremacists Think of Asians?